Yee-haw! The Rodeo is in town!

David took Thursday and Friday of Spring Break off, and we took the kids (+1) to the rodeo carnival. We didn't get to go last year because of Regan's broken arms, so she was really wanting to go this year! This was David's first time to go with us, so it was nice. We got the kids wristbands and sent them on their way. David and I went to the other side of the fairgrounds and got to spend time together walking around and checking things out, and a friend of mine's daughter is doing a Flat Stanley project, so we took a bunch of pictures of Flat Stanley with Texas Longhorns, and all the rodeo animals. It was a lot of fun just being goofy! The weather was great, nice and cool, until we got home and realized we got sunburned!

Gattiland

It's Spring Break and I'm in spring cleaning-purge mode! After cookie season, the house is a wreck so I got a wild hair and just have been going crazy! I've cleaned out the pantry, the kitchen, closets, drawers, cabinets, everything that isn't nailed down has either been tossed or is going to Goodwill. The kids have been getting in on it too, Regan cleaned all the stuffed animals off her bed and has been straightening her room (miracle)!

But, I took a break and took Regan and friends to Gattiland for Mom's Eat Free. It wasn't too crazy. I brought my iPad and read while they played video games. They had a good time and then I got home and got back to purging! Working on #40bagsin40days!

WICKED!

I was SO excited to see Wicked! It was Regan's first musical, and I wasn't sure how she would appreciate it, but I think David is probably tired of being dragged to everything that comes to town. Now I have a new play buddy!

It was great and Regan really enjoyed it. The sets and dresses were amazing. We went early so tickets weren't as expensive, but we did get pretty good seats, and not too far back to see anything, so that was nice! War Horse and Annie are coming, so I am hoping we can go see those too. I love musicals!

Icepocalypse

Well, the kids had ONE full week of school between Christmas and Spring Break this year! Crazy!! We had a delay every week or a snow day. A couple of times, it was because of the threat of ice, but we never got any ice. I can tell you, I'm over the cold. I know it's worse up north, but I was made for Texas summers!! So, here's the latest ice day. Got a nice 2 hour delay, but our power went out for a few hours so our clocks didn't go off, so we were running crazy all morning anyway!

Radiant Conference

The Radiant Conference this year was AMAZING!! I really enjoyed it, and was so happy that we managed to sell out of our cookies right before the conference started, so I could go and not worry about anything but volunteering! It started Thursday night with Priscilla Shirer, who is one of my absolute favorite speakers, and then Friday morning, Friday evening, and Saturday morning, with Lisa Bevere, and our Pastors, Joe and Lori Champion. The music was great, the specials were awesome, it was just really top-notch. I really enjoyed it, and getting to spend time with friends and have lunch and just have a kind of "girls weekend"!  (David did campus support)  Here's a recap video:
 http://celebrationtx.smugmug.com/Events/Radiant-Conference-2014/Videos/i-sWtTzzF

Juan in a Million

This is one of our favorite places to eat breakfast! And, I had a Groupon that was about to expire, AND we got to beat the SXSW crowds, and celebrate the (near) end of cookie season.

We always get the "Don Juan" and Riley has never before finished it, even though he always talks smack about how he can eat 2 or 3 of them if he wanted. Well, he finally was able to finish one, but it looks like he's about to hurl it up!

So after breakfast, Regan and I headed back out to finish up our cookie selling!

Marathon Selling!

Regan has almost always sold over 1000 boxes of Girl Scout cookies. The first year we didn't, but every year after that we have. She loves being a "top seller" and getting recognized at the awards ceremony at the end of the year, and of course, all the prizes that go with being a 1000+ seller! Well, she's been wanting to UP that goal for a while now, and I've been dragging my feet. I get tired of people thinking I'm MAKING her do all these booths, poor child! But this year, we have a different baker so we got some different cookies, and I thought this might be a good year to try a higher goal.

Well, then we had all the bad weather and they canceled a lot of our good booths, and I didn't think we would make it. THEN, they extended the sale by 2 weeks, and I said, "Let's go for it!" Well, not the 2000 she was WANTING!! But, we are so close now to hitting 1500!!

But of course, that includes a few days of marathon cookie selling! We spent the day bouncing back and forth between Walmart booths with other crazy cookie friends! I actually think the 8 hours of booths was harder on me than on her, since I was coming down with a cold. And our last booth, from 6-8, the birds attacked and I got pooped on a couple of times, but so did the table and our boxes, and everything, it was SO gross! Thankfully our partner had some wet wipes so we were able to clean everything off. Overall, it was a pretty "crappy" booth :)

So here is Regan and her friend Natalie at the beginning of the sale, and Regan and Marillah at the end.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Regan told me the other day, "Mom, no more homemade Valentine's, okay?" Ugh, shot to the heart! It was bad enough that this was my very last school Valentine party to go to, now I can't even make fun Valentine's!? So, I bought her some Fun Dip and called it a day. She signed up to bring Ranch Dip (the good kind, she said) and David had the day off work, so I figured we would both go.

First, David made surprise lunch reservations for us at Fogo de Chau! The kids have separate things tonight (Riley and David are off to Ft. Hood, Regan and I have a cookie booth) so we figured we would celebrate early. It was nice! After lunch, we ran to the store to get the good dip, then went to Regan's school, where David surprised her with flowers.

I think she liked having her daddy come and bring them to her too! Then we came home and took a nap before we had to run pick up kids, get cookies, and go our separate directions. Ah, true love. It's not all hearts and flowers, it's the day to day commitment of being there for each other through thick and thin and still being able to have a conversation over the lunch table (that's not about the kids!)

Bling Your Booth!

Our Girl Scout Council is having a competition to "Bling Your Booth"! So Regan and her friend Marillah decided to get together and bling our booth! The only problem was it was SO COLD! And we had a busy day with early booths, and Saturday church now, so the booth we were at was 8-10pm! It was so late, and we were so cold! But the girls did great, we had signs and super-hero capes and tiaras and pink hair chalk and Mardi Gras beads, and all kinds of glitter! Not to mention gloves and scarves and ear wraps and puffy coats! And cake pops!!

And to top it all off, they still managed to sell 40 boxes. Way to go girls!

Daddy Daughter Dance

Our church hosted a Daddy Daughter Dance Friday night, and Regan was SO excited! She loves to go get a new dress, and make David get a matching shirt so they can go not-dance together!

Of course, it's hard to find a dress for a girl who's not a little girl anymore, and not a hoochie mama! Junior departments at the mall are crazy! Dresses are so short or so low cut, it was very hard to find something appropriate. And, Regan was home from school for 2 days this week with strep, so I was out shopping, texting her pictures of outfits, buying and returning things she decided didn't look as great in person as in the picture. Busy week!

But, we finally found the perfect dress, David (I) bought her a corsage, and she had me crimp her hair, put a little glitter on the eyes, and she wore her tiara. They looked so cute together! I hear they had a great time, even though she didn't want to dance, and David didn't want to enter the dad's break dancing competition. She had a sleepover birthday party to go to afterward, so David took her to dinner and then dropped her off at her friends.

Middle School Band

What what?? Hard to believe my BABY is going into middle school! Today was band try outs. Back in my day (that makes me sound old) but you just picked an instrument, bought it, and you were in. Today, Regan had to go try all the instruments and they tell you which one you would be good at. Which was neat, because she has a "tear drop" shaped upper lip which made flute kind of hard for her to play, so they really discouraged her from that. She was wanting flute or oboe (and being a flute player of 7 years, I was trying not to sway her one way or the other, even though flute is better). But she tried the clarinet and really liked it! She had the perfect lips for it (big bottom lip) and then she tried the trumpet and that was a resounding NO. She (nor I) can make the right lip sound for that. So, then she went to the oboe. She did really well on it! And the funny thing is, her BFF across the street was in front of us and she fell in love with the bassoon. So, they could end up right next to each other! The only thing is, they will only be able to have 2 or 3 bassoonists and 2 oboists. The band director said she did well, but they have to wait and see who all tried out, and who did the best. So, fingers crossed (and prayers said) that she gets the oboe and Piper gets the bassoon!

Cold Selling!

It's been SO cold lately, and we've missed a lot of booths due to bad weather, so we are really trying to make up the time. We did a booth after school, and it was SO COLD! We couldn't feel our nose or fingers about halfway in. And the bad part was, we only sold 11 boxes! We had a really cute customer though. Although, this is NOT the "Cookies for the Troops" program!

Daisy Training

Part of being a Cadette this year, means Regan is now allowed to help train the Daisy's to sell cookies! Each Daisy can only sell at a booth for 1 hour, so they don't get a lot of time to learn, but they are so cute, and you get to sell a lot more when people want to buy from the cute little ones. Regan was a great helper, and she gets to add this to her community service log!

Guess Who?

Pam found these two old pictures of David and realized how much they looked like Riley! So I had to look and find some to match. Can't believe how much they look alike!

One Big Update!

It's been busy lately, haven't had much chance to update things.

Riley's been doing PT for his knee injury. We got the all-clear this week so he's really enjoying being back on full workouts at school. He can run and lift weights again, so he's happy.  He got an invitation to a Naval Academy Admissions Forum in Houston last weekend, so he and David went for Friday night, spent the night with David's cousin Jimmy, and did the admissions forum on Saturday. It sounded like they got a lot of good information, and Riley came home with a renewed determination to keep those grades up!!

For Regan and I, cookie season is on in full force. I have done the big cookie lottery, the cookie mega-drop, and we've completed our first week of cookie sales. I think we've sold around 300 boxes so far, but I need to do a good count.  Her science fair is over, and I couldn't be happier. I hate science fairs almost as much as I hate spiders. There's no need for either, really.

Today we had a SNOW DAY! Really, an ice day. It's been hilarious watching everyone on Facebook make fun of us wussy Austinites, but really, there were over 250 car accidents in the last 2 days with all the ice on the roads. So, we've just stayed home, eaten soup, and slept in. Can't complain! (Well, I can, because David keeps the house so cold, I have taken to wearing my jacket and scarf, and ear wrap, and gloves, INSIDE!) I'm a true Texan. I am ready for summer!

Tonight, David is at a men's conference at church, Riley is at Sea Cadets, Regan has 2 friends over, I have people coming to pick up cookies, Hunter ate a bag of powdered sugar, and it looks like a cocaine bust gone bad in my living room!!